


She's Your God, You're Her Demon

by CharothLikesCookies



Category: Thrilling Intent (Web Series)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-05-16
Updated: 2016-12-30
Packaged: 2018-06-08 17:53:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,247
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6867346
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CharothLikesCookies/pseuds/CharothLikesCookies
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A being less experienced with masks may have been fooled, but Xin is well versed in masks. He can see the conflict underneath, the slight tremor in Markus’ clenched fists, and Xin knows he is right about Markus. Xin’s words strike too close for Markus’ comfort. Xin’s smirk gains strength while his eyes remain locked on the Demon. Xin begins his final blow.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Part I

Xin finds this situation both humorous and, if he’s completely honest, frightening. Here he is facing the strongest Godslayer he’s encountered in generations, a demon if their ever was one. A demon who Xin has apparently anger with his treatment of his truly dear sister, Ashe. It’s quite the picture, a God and a Demon snarling at each other over another God’s welfare.

The Demon facing Xin, Markus, has made it clear in the past week that Xin is not someone he trusts. In Ashe’s presence, Markus has maintained a facade of politeness, knowing better than to attack him directly in her presence. Ashe may not have always trusted Xin, but his aid and protection before and during the war has made her more forgiving of his quirks. Markus is a different story. Now Horaven has drawn Ashe away and Xin and Markus are without a buffer. 

They stand on a path in twilight. Flowers quietly sprout around Xin’s feet. He faces Markus on the tree lined path.

“Do you care for her at all?” There is fire in Markus’ eyes, an unspoken threat in his voice.

“Of course,” Xin replies without hesitance. The question is simple. Xin’s voice does not waiver and neither do his eyes. His eyes are half-lidded but are watching the tiefling. Xin’s smirk, however, is weak, barely there. The shadows around the two stretch toward Markus ominously.

Markus’ eyes narrow.

“You call her your sister and yet you used her as a general to raid Xincala. How can you reconcile those extremes?”

Xin tries to hide his discomfort at the reminder of the unfortunate raid.

“I tried to give her what she needed to realize who she really is. The raid may benefitted my cause but, despite its poor execution, it helped Ashe more than it helped me.”

“Placing loose cannons under her command, painting her hands with the blood of innocents, that’s what you call helping her? Sending her against the city her friends had sworn to defend helped her more than it helped you? Somehow, I doubt that. We could have helped her if she thought you would allow it.”

“Don’t you mean if she thought you would allow it?” Xin interrupts. Markus stops, shadows hanging on his features. Xin needles him further.

“You know as well as she does, the glaivesman would have never aided her in her pursuits. Ashe assumed that you would be the same as him: caring, but not enough to be able to support her in this. But that isn’t true at all, is it?”

Xin pauses for effect, watching Markus carefully. Markus tries to shield his emotions with a blank mask. A being less experienced with masks may have been fooled, but Xin is well versed in masks. He can see the conflict underneath, the slight tremor in Markus’ clenched fists, and Xin knows he is right about Markus. Xin’s words strike too close for Markus’ comfort. Xin’s smirk gains strength while his eyes remain locked on the Demon. Xin begins his final blow.

“You love her.”

Markus’ mask slips slightly, but he does not respond. Anger and fear flash across Markus’ face. The shadows begin to pool around his feet. Xin continues.

“You would have helped Ashe in the raid even if all those guards had to die. You wouldn’t have liked it, but you would have done it. If she had asked you to fight, to go against your moral code and kill for her, you would do it. It’s funny, isn’t it? A demon willing to sin for a God. One willing to fight an old God like myself to defend his God and her wishes. Don’t worry, Devil, I mean your Aesling no harm. I care for her as much as you do, though my care is more familial than yours.

“Ashe came to me looking to discover who she is. I told her what I could, but one cannot simply be told who they are to a tee. The details, about who she is and what she wants to be, Ashe had to discover for herself. I provided the testing grounds for her to find the answers she needed. Ashe had to test herself to find where he loyalties lie. But you know that, don’t you? That’s part of what your afraid of. You’re quite terrified, aren’t you, Devil?”

Markus snaps. Tendrils of shadow thrash about him as hopeless fury conquers his expression. Markus snarls out his response.

“Yes, I’m terrified. I have fought for every speck of trust I have from Ashe. I have fought to be by her side, even if she doesn’t need me there. Then you show up. You send her to battle, and I learn she thinks so little of my loyalty that Ashe expects me to stop her rightful crusade. Of course, being Ashe, she manages to complete the mission without my help. I help in the aftermath, to keep her out of the clans’ sights, but Ashe hardly needs me to do that. She hardly needs me by her side. Ashe doesn’t think to ask for me by her side. Before all of this, before you, maybe she would have asked. I’ve lost everything I had with her and I can’t even be entirely mad about it. You are a bastard who risked Ashe needlessly, but you’re right when you say it helped her. I can hardly believe it, but its true. 

Xin, you’ve taken what little I had of Ashe away. You call her my God. Ha! I am her Demon, devoted, but I own nothing of her. Understand, however, if you hurt Ashe, I will kill you.”

The world around them is cold and dark as Markus’ shadows build. Xin hides a shiver.

“I don’t think my sister needs requires your protection, Demon.”

“That doesn’t mean she doesn’t have it. Watch yourself.”

A yell rings through the air.

“That’s some big talk, Spaghetti Man! Let’s go!”

Horaven comes sailing through the air, swords swinging down at Markus from above. Markus’ shadows solidify, catching Horaven midair and tugging his blades from his grasp effortlessly. The shadows tighten, leaving Horaven no room to struggle. 

The pooled darkness lifts Markus to hang menacingly in front Horaven’s helpless form. Markus’ eyes are cold fire, deadly and detached.

“This is not the time to challenge me. I remember your role in these affairs, Horaven the hero,” Markus warns lowly. The sound carries through the silent clearing. Then the silence is shattered.

“Markus!” Ashe shouts through the dark.


	2. Chapter 2

Ashe and Horaven are looking at Horaven’s new book on paladins when he mentions it.

“You know, I’m surprised you left the blonde haired one with Xin.”

Ashe looks up from the book with an eyebrow raised.

“Why is that surprising?”

Horaven shrugs.

“With the spaghetti man’s dislike of Xin and Xin’s ability to get under one’s skin, I thought any private meeting between them would end…Messily.”

Ashe opens her mouth to dispute the statement, but then closes it as she realizes she has nothing to dispute it with. Ashe tries to draw up an example of Xin an Markus getting along and finds none. Realizing this, Ashe leaves Horaven’s house quickly, with a confused Horaven trailing behind.

The two wind through the trails back to where they had parted ways with Markus and Xin. Sure enough, tension hangs thick in the air as they approach the clearing and the shadows grow unnaturally dark. Ashe grows nervous.

Suddenly, Ashe and Horaven step within earshot. Xin’s taunts drift to them.

“…Ashe assumed that you would be the same as him: caring, but not enough to be able to support her in this. But that isn’t true at all, is it?…You love her.”

Ashe freezes. Horaven bumps against her back when she halts suddenly, but Ashe doesn’t notice. Her mind tumbles into turmoil. The only clear thought she can pick out is “what?” which is not all that helpful in understanding the situation. Ashe picks up pieces of Xin’s speech.

“… It’s funny, isn’t it. A demon willing to sin for a God… Don’t worry, Devil, I mean your Aesling no harm…Ashe had to test herself to find where he loyalties lie. But you know that, don’t you? That’s part of what your afraid of. You’re quite terrified, aren’t you, Devil?”

Markus responds. His voice is so different from what Ashe expects, so angry, so dangerous, that she finds herself jarred to attention. 

“Yes, I’m terrified. I have fought for every speck of trust I have from Ashe. I have fought to be by her side, even if she doesn’t need me there. Then you show up. You send her to battle, and I learn she thinks so little of my loyalty that Ashe expects me to stop her rightful crusade. Of course, being Ashe, she manages to complete the mission without my help. I help in the aftermath, to keep her out of the clans’ sights, but Ashe hardly needs me to do that. She hardly needs me by her side. Ashe doesn’t think to ask for me by her side. Before all of this, before you, maybe she would have asked. I’ve lost everything I had with her and I can’t even be entirely mad about it. You are a bastard who risked Ashe needlessly, but you’re right when you say it helped her. I can hardly believe it, but it’s true. 

Xin, you’ve taken what little I had of Ashe away. You call her my God. Ha! I am her Demon, devoted, but I own nothing of her. Understand, however, if you hurt Ashe, I will kill you.”

Ashe, sensing the honesty of the threat and the mounting fury, hastens toward the conflict in the clearing, finally roused fully from her stupor. She’s still confused, but the situation at hand requires action. Horaven keeps pace with her, a scowl covering his face.

They catch sight of the battle of wills as Xin responds.

“I don’t think my sister needs requires your protection, Demon.”

Markus has shadows pooled around his feet. His fury is tangible, hanging in the air like smoke over a growing brushfire.

“That doesn’t mean she doesn’t have it. Watch yourself.”

Horaven can’t take the threat to to Xin within his eyesight. He leaps into action, blades drawn.

“That’s some big talk, Spaghetti Man! Let’s go!”

Ashe tenses ready to intervene and stop Horaven, but Markus is faster in this case. Ashe gapes as Markus disarms and neutralizes the hero in a heartbeat. Horaven is left hanging in the air, as harmless as a kitten. In the uneasy quiet of the clearing, Ashe can hear Markus’ threat to Horaven.

“This is not the time to challenge me. I remember your role in these affairs, Horaven the hero.”

A chill runs down Ashe’s back. Markus’ voice is icy and scorching all at once. The shadows that writhe under his command are tinged with eldritch energy and clearly deadly. Ashe doesn’t even think before she takes a step forward and shouts.

“Markus!”

Silence fills the clearing. Markus’ eyes are wild and wide as they lock on Ashe. In an instant, Markus jolts back from Horaven, sinking to the ground. Horaven is dropped unceremoniously to the ground as well and goes to reach for his blades to attack but Xin interrupts him.

“I believe that is our cue to leave, Horaven. Good luck, demon!” 

Xin walks down the path away from Markus and his still swirling shadow. Xin’s smirk has returned and his eyes have slid shut as he makes his exit with a reluctant Horaven trailing behind.

Ashe and Markus are left in the dark clearing, the shadows having cast unfamiliar night upon this section of the banlands. 

After a long pause, Ashe steps forward. Markus flinches, averting his eyes. His shadows thrash and stretch higher. The dark magic wraps around the tiefling. Ashe hesitates, uncertain of how to approach this situation. Generally, when Markus does something dangerous and/or stupid, Ashe hits him, shouts for awhile, and they move on with their lives. For some reason Ashe doesn’t think that is the best solution to the current events. She eyes the shadows. 

“Markus?” Ashe calls through the barrier. Markus doesn’t react.

Ashe is still around ten feet away from Markus’ wild magic. It circles Markus with a radius of five feet. If Markus won’t respond to her calls, Ashe will have to pass through the shadows to reach him.

Ashe takes a deep breath. She steps to the edge of the magic’s reach and pauses there. Then, Ashe reaches a shaking hand out to the curling shadows, expecting a painful rebuff. There is none.

The angry tendrils part around her arm. Ashe lets out a sigh of relief and steps through the barrier. Markus hasn’t moved, hasn’t looked up.

“Markus?” Ashe asks quietly. Her voice echoes off the magic barrier around them.  
“Yes…” Markus responds in a whisper, unmoving. The anger is gone. His expression is unreadable and his voice is too faint to interpret.

“What were…what was…?” Ashe tries to articulate her questions and fails the first time. Markus waits.

“What were you doing, Markus?”

Markus swallows hard. Ashe continues, asking another question from the storm of them that pummels her thoughts.

“What right do you have to threaten Xin and Horaven?”

“I had no right, I suppose, but I won’t apologize. I assume you heard enough to know my purpose,” Markus says tightly, eyes still locked on the ground.

Ashe stops. She recalls what Markus said to Xin. She recalls what Xin told Markus when she arrived. It all overwhelms her. Ashe finds herself lost in thought and Markus keeps staring at the ground. Ashe takes a deep breath and lets out the questions she dreads asking.

“Markus? Did I…hear you and Xin right earlier? And…was any of it true?”

Markus’ eyes flash to Ashe’s and then flicker away again.

“I don’t know what you heard. I know that my words were honest … And I must begrudgingly admit that Xin, while a bastard, didn’t lie with regards to me.”

Ashe blinks rapidly for a moment. Well, doesn’t that just lay a whole new layer of tension overhead?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the long stretch of silence; work and a new puppy have conspired to take up all my free time. Hopefully this chapter was worth the wait! Expect a couple more postings from me in the near future.


	3. Chapter 3

Ashe takes a shuddering breath. Pushing aside the most volatile sections of Xin’s minefield, Ashe brings up a merely unsettling topic.

“Xin called me your god.”

“An example of language’s imprecision. I don’t own you, just as a servant does not own his master.”

“I don’t own you, Markus!”

Markus finally looks at Ashe with eyes filled with disbelief. He shakes his head quickly and laughs breathily.

“No, I suppose you would find paperwork on the sale of my soul in hell. Formally we have no possession over each other, but think Aesling. Would I ever stop defending you? Would I ever take another’s side over yours unless I thought your own led to your doom?”

Ashe flounders for words, coming up with an inadequate few.

“No, but that’s because your my friend.”

“So you realize I’m loyal to you now. That’s progress, I suppose. You’re still missing the big picture, Ashe.”

“What am I missing? You are my friend and you’re loyal enough to want to defend me, just as would Gregor or Kyr.”

Markus’ eyes and magic flare. The barrier around them, that Ashe had almost forgotten, tangles wildly through the air, deepening the unnatural darkness. Markus’ eyes glow unusually in the shadows with a purple light.

“That right there is what your missing! Do you truly think I treat you like I do Gregor? That I think of you like I do Kyr? I don’t, Ashe. They are my friends and I love them as family—“

“And I’m not part of that family?” Ashe interjects rage and hurt boiling.

“How could you think that after all that Xin said, all that I’ve said?”

“Just say what you mean, Markus!”

Markus does not immediately respond, and Ashe expects him to fall back on his customary lies. She waits for him to cast away the shadows, saunter off down the, and to act like this never happened. Instead, Markus’ eyes hold hers with a steady gaze.

“I mean that Xin was right, just as I said. I love you. I would have followed you into this mess is you had asked. I would stand by your side if you let me. I will defend you even if you wish I wouldn’t. I am your demi-demon, no matter what you think of me.”

Ashe feels the air rush from her lungs like Colvin had punched her in the stomach. She had been trying to forget those pointed details of Xin’s speech, the implications in Markus’ words to him, because Ashe was certain Markus would play them off as nothing. Markus doesn’t address such matters directly. At least, ordinarily he does not.

“I don’t know what to say.”

Markus’ smile is uncomfortably sharp.

“I don’t expect you to have a response. I would have dodged your questions if I thought you’d forgive me later.” Ashe winces at his insinuation that she brought this on herself. “I won’t think less of you if you run.”

But I will think less of myself, Ashe thinks. I can speak the truth if you can Markus.

“I trust you, you know,” Ashe starts. “I trusted you from the moment I met you. If you asked me, Markus, I have no doubt I would stand with you in any cause that you believe. I don’t understand all of this, and honestly I’m a little pissed you seem to know what I am and didn’t tell me, but by Xin’s standard… by your standard… I guess I’m your demigod.”

Now its Markus’ turn to blink in surprise. 

“R-really?” Markus squeaks out. 

Ashe nods. 

The barrier of shadow shifts, calming, but not entirely dissipating. Its color changes from inky, all-absorbing black to a faintly glowing purple. Markus no longer seems to cloaked in shadowy magic. The eerie silence is broken by two owls hooting in the woods beyond the magic bubble.

Magic is tangible, though the tension of early has eased. Ashe feels her power buzzing beneath her skin, and she clenches and unclenches her hands as they seem to vibrate with the sensation. The hairs on the back of Ashe’s neck stand on end as a she feels Markus’ magic graze across her own inexplicably.

Ashe’s left hand moves, and, before she thinks to stop it, Markus’ right rise to meet it.

A blinding white flash erupts from between their palms. The magical discharge shatters the barrier around Ashe and Markus. The birds perched in the trees surrounding the area, either sleeping or hunting, take to the skies. The grass waves in the shockwave and stills.

Ashe and Markus both cry out, expecting pain to accompany the surprise, but there is none. Ashe quickly turns her palm toward her. She gasps at the sight, unknowingly mirroring Markus.

On Ashe’s palm, in a shade of purplish-red, is a pentagram signed in the middle with “M.V.” The handwriting and general style of the symbol is that of Markus’ signature.

Ashe looks up, preparing to yell a question on what happened, but stops when she sees Markus. He is gaping at his own hand with a befuddled expression. Ashe reaches for Markus’ right hand. She positions it palm up next to her right.

Markus’ hand is marked as well. A stranger wouldn’t recognize the spiral of green lightning as a signature, but Ashe knows it is one all the same. 

“What could this be?” Markus mutters almost to himself.

“I have no idea. You don’t…” Ashe says.

“Not a clue.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, it's been a while. Life gets in the way sometimes. I hope you enjoyed the chapter.


	4. Chapter 4

Ashe and Markus don’t tell anyone about the marks or really anything about that days in the woods. The agreement is unspoken but clear: no one needs to know what happened there in the woods. Ashe keeps her hand covered with a bandage, and after a few weeks Gregor stops asking if her hand is okay and just accepts that this is something new that Ashe does. Markus hides the lightning pattern with a glamour and it goes unnoticed. The commitments they made in the clearing hold, but change little of their everyday lives.

Markus quietly researches what the marks could mean. He scours the libraries and bookshops they encounter as best he can without drawing the attention of Inien, the only other of their group with enough magical knowledge to pick up on what he’s doing. If he’s honest, Markus would have to admit Inien may have more idea of what he’s looking for than he does. Markus skims through the rare tomes that talk of Meathean rituals, pours over his own old scrolls on oaths, and, at a loss, tries even the records of the spiritfolk of the Shrouded Isles, hoping to find something similar. Markus finds nothing that matches.

The marks aren’t simply for looks either.

The Nine Shrines team gets their first job after returning from Xincala, and the marks begin to show that they are more than symbols. In battle Markus summons eldritch blasts and shadows and Ashe can see the mark on her palm glow through the bandages. Markus casts a spell with waggling fingers and a Ashe feels as if the pentagram is grazed by a light touch.

At the end of the day, Markus, Gregor, and Thog all need medical attention. For the minor bumps and scratches Ashe is fine with bandaging them up, but she lends her power for Markus’ bruised ribs and Thog’s worst burns. The discomfort of using her healing had been reduced before, but now Ashe feels only a slight twinge. She catches Markus flexing his right hand as her own glowing hands pass over injuries. 

Jobs pass and both Markus and Ashe grow used to being conscious of every time the other uses spells or similar skills. They are separated at times on jobs, by necessity or chance. This matters little until their second war.

Thog, Inien, and Ashe are at the war camp, coordinating the troops. Gregor and Markus volunteered to lead a scouting party that morning. Ashe knows the second the battle begins. She’s staring over the maps, trying to break up Thog and Inien’s argument over whether attacking from the south or south-west would be more effective, when she feels the tell-tale touch of Markus summoning an eldritch blast. Ashe is used to this sensation, but worries. Her eyes pass over the south-eastern path Gregor and Markus had gone to scout.

There’s not supposed to be anyone there.

“Ashe?…Ashe!” Thog asks at her mid-sentence lapse to silence. Ashe starts.

“Your godly senses tingling?” Inien asks. Ashe hesitates, not wanting to explain how she knows something is wrong. Then she’s distracted by feeling Markus draws a strong surge of his demonic power. Thog and Inien watch confused as Ashe’s eyes widen. Ashe bolts from the planning tent toward the path Gregor and Markus left on that morning.

She’s halfway down the path, with most of warriors in camp racing after her, when Ashe feels something entirely new. She freezes in her tracks as she feels the sensation she associates with healing. Ashe stares at her hand for a long beat. They’re not glowing green with power. The pentagram glows red under its covering. Ashe starts running again.

Ashe find Markus crouched over Gregor’s unconscious form. Bodies of enemy soldiers are strewn, bloodied about the path. Markus’ eyes are scrunched closed in concentration as his right hand passes over a long slash across Gregor’s chest. The lightning pattern shines brightly, but the wound refuses to knit fully. 

Ashe pushes Markus’ hand away and takes his place. Under her care the wound disappears in an instant. Markus sighs in relief.

“Thank you. I managed to heal his head wound but that slash…” Markus says sounding exhausted.

“How did you know you could use my powers?” Ashe asks. She helps Markus stand and lifts Gregor’s still unconscious body.

“I didn’t,” Markus says. “But I had to try.” 

Any response that Ashe had to that is cut off as the warriors that followed Ashe run up with Thog and Inien. 

“I guess we’re attacking from the south-east then,” Thog says, disgruntled. Inien fist pumps. Then Inien catches sight of the lightning swirl on Markus’ palm that he hasn’t re-glamoured. Inien grabs his wrist with a sharklike grin.

“What do we have here?” 

“Nothing!” Markus and Ashe say at the same time. Inien snorts and Thog shakes his head.

“I don’t even know what she’s talking about, but with that reaction I know it’s not nothing,” Thog says as he stalks off to yell at the troops.

“I’ll ask again: What do we have here?” Inien says looking carefully over Markus’ mark. Ashe and Markus don’t respond.  
“I’m going to take your silence as ‘we have no fucking clue! Inien, help us,’” Inien says. “I’m going to guess from the green lightning involved and how you added your ‘nothing’ to this pile of something that you’re part of this Ashe. Which would make me think that…”

Inien trails off and then snatches Ashe’s bandaged left hand, almost causing Ashe to drop Gregor. Inien deftly removes the bandage. Her eyes light up at the sight of the pentagram. She shakes her head.

“Of course you two would get yourselves magically entangled in a way only the two of you ever could.”

**Author's Note:**

> Third time writing this thanks to computers scheming against me. Hope you enjoyed it. Feel free to comment.


End file.
